I joined this site not 20 minutes ago JUST because of this article. I'll go anywhere if the fanbase is strong there.

Although I disagree with this article on one point - the 80s and 90s MLP cartoons weren't really bad at all. G3 is your only enemy. The first special, Rescue at Midnight Castle (AKA Battle for Midnight Castle, or the title of the VHS release "Firefly's Adventure") was surprisingly dark, depressing, angsty, violent, and epic. (SPOILER they outright kill the final villain, Tirek). I do not hesitate to say that for the time, it was FiM-tier, if not greater. It's easily my favorite story in the entire franchise, and this isn't even me being a purist, since I didn't even know MLP had a show until FiM. I also thought the '92 series, My Little Pony Tales, was awesome just for the character diversity (tons of male characters, and for the most part they aren't even portrayed as jerks. Lancer is cool, and if Teddy were a real person today he would SO be a brony. In fact the only pure jerk among them was Ace, and he was voiced by Light Yagami, so I can live with that...). And the FiM stories that were taken from Tales, I think, were actually handled better in Tales. For example, imagine if at the end of the FiM episode "The Ticket Master", instead of getting a bunch more tickets from the supreme overlord of the entire world, they had simply scalped the tickets, bought pizza and enjoyed hanging out with each other. That, to me, sounds like a much more practical ending that sends a more accurate message. Hence we have the MLPTales episode "And the Winner Is..."

Anyway, yeah. Watch Rescue at Midnight Castle, and I DARE you to tell me that FiM isn't one giant homage to that. If Lauren Faust wanted us to hate it she wouldn't have used it as a starting point.

Not to degrade FiM, though, since it IS extremely awesome and probably the greatest fanbase I've ever been a part of.

For the fandom itself, I've gotta say...I love pretty much any non-shipping fanfics. And especially tearjerkers. I also like some of the comics. Anything by Madmax, and again, tearjerkers like the "Derpy is the best mother" comic. I also like the fan-music, and have partaken in remixing and original work myself. My favorite artist is VoodooPony, second favorite is NotACleverPony. Eurobeat has some interesting stuff but it gets old. Oh also rainbowcrash88 is awesome.

Anyway, yeah. Long-winded first post on these forums, but it was worth it.

I joined this site not 20 minutes ago JUST because of this article. I'll go anywhere if the fanbase is strong there.

Welcome to Icrontic, DavidReinold! Glad to have you on board with us.

I've had many mention Rescue at Midnight Castle post-publishment of that piece. I have to admit, the statements I wrote were out of ignorance - I've never watched any of the old MLP outside of various episodes my sister used to watch when we were young.

Also, I'm a sucker for tearjerkers as well. Not sure what it is about them, but I dig sad stories. non-shipping tearjerkers are my ticket.

Well I must say this community of MLP:FIM is reason I came and signed up on Icrontic today. I used to shun MLP or anything with those words My Little Pony. But like about 2 months ago I was curious since I saw more and more of the not common name My Little Pony but My Little Pony Friendship is Magic. Out of natural curiosity I checked it and even view which episodes was best. In terms I watched Sonic Rainboom as my first episode. Needless to say I liked it. Therefore I now have watched all 26 episodes of season 1, and both current episodes of season 2. Not to add I scavenger for all fanfics I can find, "Even clopfics, or "others"" However I try to avoid tearjerkers since last one I read I couldn't sleep that night. I have no idea why, but it nailed me with something I couldn't forget. It was this one if curious: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6684207/1/The_Last_Treasure
An yes I have read "Cupcakes series", I ran out of bleach trying to clean my eyes of images.

I plan to get familiar with Icrontic here, compared to few other places that are annoying. Till then I will be laying low and "reading" and viewing more then I will posting. Though commenting may be done so, but it depends how things go. Posting this made me feel better by 20%. At least now I can link pony haters to this. So Ty Bobby Miller for this awesome topic.

On Topic: I feel this article hits the nail on the head. Great job. What more needs to be said. (lol unintentional rhyme)

Slightly Off Topic: Was out surfing the inter-webs and somehow found my way to this article and this website for for first time. I'm used to the pony craze (need to be when there is at least one pony related item on the front of Deviant Art daily,) but the rest of the site caught my interest, Almost as if it speaks to me. So I decided to join in. Here's to good times ahead!

"Why is it so huge when other cartoons of relative quality donâ€™t? Simpleâ€”itâ€™s the community."

That's it right there, really. I have no problem with MLP. It's the community that I have a problem with.

I watched an episode and decided that the show wasn't for me. I was happy enough to leave it at that. But people WILL NOT SHUT UP about it at me. I'm happy to leave well enough alone. Why aren't you?

The reason they won't leave you alone is that majority of the fanbase didn't like the first episode they saw, and they know that if you saw a few more episodes, you'd probably get hooked.

And honestly, if the episode you saw was the very first one, I can see why it wouldn't hook you. Episode 1 was probably the one of the worst episode in the entire series, alongside the Dave Polsky episodes (15 and 21). Trust me, this is one series where if you're judging it on just one episode, you're judging it WAY too soon. For me, it took until episode 7 to realize that I ACTUALLY wanted to watch the show.

The reason they won't leave you alone is that majority of the fanbase didn't like the first episode they saw, and they know that if you saw a few more episodes, you'd probably get hooked.

And honestly, if the episode you saw was the very first one, I can see why it wouldn't hook you. Episode 1 was probably the one of the worst episode in the entire series, alongside the Dave Polsky episodes (15 and 21). Trust me, this is one series where if you're judging it on just one episode, you're judging it WAY too soon. For me, it took until episode 7 to realize that I ACTUALLY wanted to watch the show.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. You're actually hopping on "Over A Barrel"? I thought that was actually pretty well done.

Feeling Pinkie Keen I definitely could have done without, though. It was just kind of asking for trouble.

But yeah, most will tell you you should probably watch a -couple- of episodes. What REALLY irks me are the people who refuse to even watch it at all.

Over a Barrel was obnoxious because in the end, you can't really tell what the HELL the message was supposed to be. I won't deny that it had some hilarious moments, but when you get down to it's purpose as an episode, it didn't really hold any value as kids show material. And let's face it - if we want this show to keep going, we want it to have value as a kids show.

Of course everyone says Hasbro would have to be stupid to cancel the show at this point, but let's face it, it was also extremely stupid of them to only release the blind-bag ponies in Europe and limit America to the shitty brushables. Honestly I wouldn't put any stupidity past them.

I won't lie, I watch Phineas and Ferb with my daughter and like it. Something tells me if Dr. Doofenshmirtz were after those adorable pony's instead of the semi adorable nighttime obsessed pony, the show would get a huge ratings bump! Crossover!

View this video for the Fallout 3: Equestria. You cannot lie that the trailer/video is 20% cooler now, your argument will be invalid if so. Though I did not care much for that fanfic anyway, but might read it for fact I can. Not had a lot of time on my hands to do so, nor come here to post.